Tali had her hand over the depression and was preparing to move the bone back into place when the horse whinnied. She went for the knife, which was on the other side of Holm, but Red-whiskers charged from the bushes and kicked it out of her hand. The blackbeard, Crebb, hauled Tali up by the hair, put his arms around her middle from behind and held her in an unbreakable grip.
“Got you!” said Red-whiskers, and punched her in the mouth.
She sagged, staring at him in terror. The lower half of her face was a mass of pain, running all the way up along her jawline to the sides of her skull.
Tali had suffered a number of beatings in Cython, before she had mastered Nurse Bet’s bare-handed art, but she had never experienced anything like the savage glee with which Red-whiskers had attacked her.
He drew back his fist for another blow, then clutched at his side, groaning. His own jaw hung oddly, dislocated when the horse’s shoulder had struck him. His face was a swollen mess and each tortured breath made a bubbling sound in his chest. Had a broken rib punctured a lung? He also had dozens of bloody punctures from the thorn bush, and some were red and shiny.
Red-whiskers twitched, grimaced, shuddered. He was in agony and wanted to inflict as much pain on her. He thumped her again, then clutched at his chest. Strands of pink saliva hung from his gaping mouth. Tali swallowed a mouthful of her own blood, wondering if it would have any healing powers on her.
Red-whiskers spat blood onto the ground and raised his fist for a third blow.
“Enough!” said Crebb. “You’ll kill her.”
“Want to kill the little bitch,” slurred Red-whiskers.
“No! Where do you think I’ve been while you were lazing in the thorn bush?”
“Running for your gutless life. You’re never around when the dirty work needs doing.”
Crebb dropped Tali beside Holm and put a hobnailed boot in the middle of her back. “I can safely leave that to you. Someone has to do the thinking.”
“All right, I’ll bite,” Red-whiskers said sullenly. “Where did you get to?”
For the moment they weren’t looking at Tali. She slid a hand across Holm’s skull and located the depressed fracture. It was a far more difficult healing than fixing his broken nose, and more dangerous, too. If she moved a splinter of bone the wrong way, he could die.
She wasn’t sure she could do it. What if she had judged wrong? No, hesitation would be just as fatal; just do it. Forcing the pain in her mouth and the throb in her jaw into the background, she drew power to ease the cracked skull bone into place.
“Followed their tracks back across the dunes,” said Crebb. “They came from the sea, you moron. Across the mudflats from the iceberg that stranded last night.”
He whistled up the other two horses. They came running, their manes streaming out behind them.
“Who cares where they came from?” Red-whiskers drew back a massive boot, as if to kick Tali in the head. She could see the hobnails in the sole.
Heal, heal! she thought frantically.
Crebb thrust him aside. “Enough! There’s a reward, a big one.”
“Never heard about no reward,” Red-whiskers said sullenly.
“Because you can’t read. There are notices along the road. A big reward for an old man and a young blonde woman who’ve come from the sea.”
“How big?” Red-whiskers’ manner implied a hope that it be not too big, so he could forgo it and get on with his battery.
“Big enough to satisfy both of us — for life.”
Heal, heal! The skull bone was hardly moving at all. Was she doing something wrong? Tali was starting to panic. If she did not succeed in the next minute, it would be too late. Once the villains tied her up there would be nothing she could do. Heal, heal!
Red-whiskers said hopefully, “Don’t suppose the reward is for dead or alive?”
“If they’re dead, our own lives are forfeit,” said Crebb. “They’re wanted alive and unharmed.”
“What for?”
“How would I know?”
“What are you gunna do with your share?”
“Haven’t got it yet.”
“When you do?”
“Head north where there’s no stinking rock rats.”
“They’ll come,” Red-whiskers said gloomily. “Reckon they’ll hold the whole of Hightspall in another month.”
“Reckon they won’t,” said Crebb. “Resistance is building up in the mountains.”
“I didn’t hear that. What’s going on?”
“A bloke called Deadhand. A great warrior — he killed Arkyz Leatherhead in five minutes flat.”
“Arkyz is dead?” said Red-whiskers.
“Deadhand took his head clean off in a single blow and sent it flying thirty feet into a dung heap.”
“Where was this?”
“Some upland fortress in the Nandelochs. Place called Garramide.”
“Is that where you’re heading?”
“My fighting days are over, and my spending days are just beginning. I’ll be heading well past Garramide. Enough talk. Help me get them on the nags.”
CHAPTER 41
Crebb hauled Holm to his feet and held him there, head lolling. Red-whiskers kicked Tali in the kidneys, just for fun. He lifted her up, groaning at the pain in his side, and tossed her over his shoulder. After spitting blood onto the ground, he headed past the horse she thought of as her own, towards the other two horses.
Holm’s right eye opened. His fist shot out and struck Tali’s horse on the inflamed gouges on its left flank. It whinnied shrilly and kicked backwards at Red-whiskers with both hooves.
One hoof struck him on the right hip, which went crack and collapsed under him, spinning him around. The other hoof caught him in the left side, caved his chest in and blasted bloody foam six feet out of his mouth. He was driven backwards, dropping Tali and impaling himself on the thorn bush.
Crebb let Holm go and swung at his face, but the effort had been too much for the old man. His legs crumpled and the blow passed over his head.
Tali’s hand closed around a stone the size of a grapefruit. She hurled it at Crebb’s groin and, from five feet away, she could hardly miss. He doubled over, retching with the pain. She picked up another rock with both hands and knocked him out, then checked on Red-whiskers. He was twitching and shuddering, his malevolent eyes fixed on her, but he could not move. He gave a last shudder, and died.
Tali looked away from the ruined body. “That could have been me,” she said, trembling all over.
“Sorry,” he said in a frail voice. “It was then or never.”
“Well, the horse did hate its master. It did seem to aim for him.”
He did not reply. Holm was swaying back and forth.
“You okay?” It hurt to talk. The lower half of Tali’s face felt like one enormous bruise and her swollen lips were very painful.
“No.” He steadied himself with his arms. “But I’m alive. Thank you.”
“Reckon you can get on a horse?”
“Suppose I’ll have to.”
“We’d better hurry,” she said, glancing at Crebb. “He could come to any time.”
“Tie him up.”
“No rope.”
She retrieved her knife, sheathed it and picked the smallest horse of the three. Holm took hold of the saddle, Tali boosted him from below and, with a lot of effort, got him into the saddle. Crebb groaned and clutched at his groin.
She took hold of the reins of the third horse, tied them to her saddle horn and clambered up like a crab trying to climb a wall.
“Where are we going?” she said.
“East then north.”
She had lost all sense of direction. “Which way would that be?”
He pointed to the right. “Keep going that way ’til you reach a rugged range, then follow it north — which will be on your left. Keep to the wildest country you can find.”
She directed her horse east, up and over a small hill, where she caught a last glimpse of the hostile sea, only a mile or two behind. The stranded iceberg was clearly visible and was bound to attract searchers.